Waiting for the miracle
by tmandragoran
Summary: End of Season 9 - Tony muses on things to come as he waits for Ziva to wake up. Highlander x-over


Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters

Summary: End of Season 9 - Tony muses on things to come as he waits for Ziva to wake up.

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Tony was angry, no furious at Dearing, at the world but most of all at himself. Why had he gone in an elevator knowing a bomb was about to go off? He should have known better. But looking down at the woman whose head was in his lap he knew the real reason he was angry. Why hadn't he protected her better. After Somalia he had sworn to himself he would protect her even though she was more then capable of protecting herself. Instead he had failed her. Again. He had been forced to watch as the light slowly drained from her eyes. She had tried to speak but he had quietly silenced her, telling her everything was going to be alright. He knew what she tried to tell him but knew that that was a conversation for a later date. She however didn't know that there was going to be a later. All she knew was that she was dying and when she had tried to say what had always been left unsaid between them, he had interrupted her, not letting her utter the words at least once before she died. The look in her eyes seemed as much from her injuries as from him seemingly rejecting her dying words of love to him.

Tony sighed to himself what a pair they made, what a mess this whole situation was.

He'd known this moment would come given how dangerous their job was and he had tried to prepare for it. But none of the scenarios he had envisioned were anything like this.

He reflected on the past decade. There had been several times when his secret had been nearly exposed, chief amongst them when Kate had been infected with Y pestis. His teacher, Cory Raines, had told him repeatedly that being a federal agent was too high profile, too dangerous. Not too mention he had already been Tony Dinozzo for nearly 18 years. He should have long since moved on by now but he hadn't been able to bring him to abandon this strange little family that was team Gibbs. When he had first become Tony Dinozzo, becoming a federal agent was the furthest thing from his mind. He'd become a cop more as a joke to Cory. He'd already been considering moving on in three to four years having already been a cop for nearly a decade then. But when he met Gibbs his curiosity had had the better of him and he hadn't been able to resist the temptation. Not to mention Cory's reaction had been pretty damn funny.

Still 18 years was a very long time for an immortal to hold on to a single identity. Even these days where remaining looking young could be explained away by good genes, healthy living or even surgery it was well past time he moved on. After all a different way of dressing and a new hairstyle could only do so much to give the impression of aging.

DC was pretty quiet when it came to immortals. Too many federal agencies, too much scrutiny. While in other places a beheading may be swept under the rug when there where no immediate suspects. Too many eyes were focused on DC for a bizarre death not to be investigated more thoroughly. He knew of only 2 other immortals that made the greater DC area their home and neither of them were violent people by nature. One was an accountant for a local pharmaceutical company and the other was a florist. He didn't even know either very well. They'd just met and done the whole not-hunting song and dance. They ran into each other occasionally but that was it. Heck most days he didn't even carry his sword. Not that he'd be able to on the job anyway.

He would often wonder when Gibbs, because out of all of them it would be him, would confront him about him not aging. Those first years at NCIS the reason for staying had been simple enough. He loved been an investigator. Then their little family had begun to form. First it had been him, Gibbs and Abby and over time Kate and McGee joining them. It still hurt when he thought about the day they lost her. And then Ziva had joined them. He'd been shocked when he first saw her. It had taken him a second to realize that she was a pre-immortal. It had been clear to all around them that there had been strong physical attraction between them from the beginning. But over the years it had first grown into a deep friendship and then love even though neither of them had ever dared to make that last leap. There was no denying that their relationship had known its ups and downs, but they had always weathered the storm and come through. Somewhat battered maybe but whole all the same.

He had no idea how Ziva was going to take the news about her newly awakened immortality and everything that accompanied it. He knew her relationship with her father was still very strained and while at first glance one would think that she'd be happy that there was no actual blood relation between them, Tony however knew how much it hurt her to be at odds with Eli. He had often been a sympathetic shoulder to lean on, ninja's didn't cry after all, during those days when she missed her father the most. Part of her hated Eli for everything he'd done to her but another part loved her father dearly and hated fighting with him. As much as she tried to shield her emotions from the outside world, Tony had always taken pride in the fact that she would lift the veil a bit more when it was just them and that she confided in him before all others. The one thing he knew for certain however that was going to be difficult for her, was the knowledge that Tali had in fact not been her sister by blood.

Of course that knowledge wasn't going to be the only thing she would find difficult to accept. The fact that he had been lying to her for nearly 8 years wasn't going to go over smoothly either. No matter the reasons he knew she would see it as a lack of trust in her. He just hoped it would a mere speed bump in their relationship and they could move past it relatively quickly.

Not wanting to think too deeply about her possible reactions to his little omissions over the years, he tried to formulate several plans on how to convince her to leave her old life behind. A plan made infinitely more complicated by the fact that she used to be Mossad officer and was now a NCIS agent. If they simply disappeared and by some miracle Gibbs and the gibblets didn't come looking for them, they would also need to evade Mossad officers. He'd considered staging a public dead but likewise her body disappearing from the morgue wouldn't go over well either with either of her families. Maybe her dying without anyone but him around wasn't so bad in the end. They could plan to leave in a year or two. Keep in touch only by phone or email and over the years slowly distance themselves from their friends and families until they could slip away into a new life.

He shook his head. None of his plans seemed without flaws or drawbacks that could lead to them being exposed. Still they had time to plan an exit strategy.

His thoughts turned to her sword training, he would need to find a teacher for her. At first he had considered teaching her himself but he didn't think he would be up to the challenge. He wanted her to have the best possible chance at surviving for a very long time and not only was he pretty young himself, he freely admitted that he was not the greatest swordsmen around. He had never liked the game and always tried to avoid fights. In his 136 years he'd only taken three heads, none of them older then three hundred and only as a last resort when they couldn't be dissuaded from a fight. Fortunately her Mossad training had already covered many of the same things an immortal needed to know like creating new identities, self defense, adapting a new persona... He figured that she only needed sword training to round out her skills and maybe some retraining to not assume possible lethal injuries would put your opponent down for the count, but he didn't think she would have many problems with that.

The simplest solution would be to ask Cory to teach her, but he wasn't sure Ziva would be able to handle learning from someone who was in many ways similar to Tony in character. He and Cory had always gotten on well together, being so similar. Ziva however may well end up killing the both of them before her training was over.

Besides the last thing he wanted was Cory hitting on her and trying to charm his way into her pants. Not that he thought that Ziva would be so easily charmed or anything. He knew he got jealous easily when it came to other men in Ziva's life, CIRay being the latest example. He could handle it with most men but he didn't need to see his old teacher trying to seduce her right in front of him.

All his life he'd been a bit of a playboy. Preferring one night stands or casual flings to serious long term relationships. Even when he'd been mortal he had had commitment issues. That hadn't changed after his first death. On the contrary, Cory had advised him that long term relationships with mortals were difficult at best and to avoid it if at all possible. Relationships with immortal women were even more problematic. So all his life he'd flirted with women, seduced them into his bed and moved on. Until now.

When he had first accepted that fateful undercover mission from jenny he never could have imagined that he would truly begin to fall in love with Jeanne. And yet, even when he had well and truly fallen for her, he still knew in the back of his mind that it wouldn't last. In the end there were to many lies , too many differences between them.

Ziva however was different. When he first realized that his attraction to her had firmly moved to love, he'd tried to resist it. Surely it would never work between them. But these last few years she had become such an integral part of his life. Like he had told her in Somalia, he didn't think he could live without her. For the first time in his life he wanted to commit himself to one women. It was unfamiliar and somewhat terrifying territory for him and he had spend many a night thinking about it.

Looking down at her, he noticed that her wounds were all healed and that her quickening was beginning to rise. It was time.


End file.
